Five Experimental Chrome Settings Worth Enabling

Similar to the "Labs" section of Gmail, Google has a hidden list of experimental features that you can enable to enhance Chrome. Head to chrome://flagsand you'll find dozens of potentially upcoming features in many stages of development.

Since they aren't ready to be on by default, it goes without saying that your mileage may vary when enabling them. Google warns that your browser might delete your data and your security could be compromised. It's not unheard of for flags to cause browser crashes or blue screens, though some are inevitably riskier than others.

With that said, we've tried to pick a handful of flags that seem relatively safe and yet useful to the average Chrome install. If this isn't adventurous enough for you or if you don't want to risk your main install, Google also provides a beta build of its browser with some new features as well as Chrome Canary, which is updated almost every day.

#enable-fast-unload | Fast tab/window close

When enabled, this feature reduces the amount of time it takes for a tab to disappear when you close it. Although it doesn't actually end the process any faster, the tab will close instantly while the process finishes being shut down in the background, making for a more fluid experience.

Available for: Windows, Mac, Linux, Chrome OS, Android

#automatic-tab-discarding | Automatic tab discarding

Chrome is notorious for its ability to consume memory and even machines with 8GB of RAM might run low with heavy usage. If this is an issue on your PC, you might benefit from automatic tab discarding, which removes tabs from the system memory when it starts running low. Discarded tabs are still shown in-browser and are reloaded when clicked.

Available for: Windows, Mac
Also see: Make Chrome Run Faster and Keep RAM Usage Under Control

#enable-tab-audio-muting | Tab audio muting UI control

Back in 2013 Chrome announced a new feature that displays an audio icon on tabs that are making noise. This flag allows you to mute/unmute the sound coming from a tab by clicking on that audio icon.

Available for: Windows, Mac, Linux, Chrome OS

#enable-scroll-anchoring | Scroll anchoring There are few things more frustrating while browsing than going to click a link and having it move as the web page finishes loading. This flag will prevent pages from skipping around as they load so you never misclick on another ad.

Available for: Windows, Mac, Linux, Chrome OS, Android

#enable-gpu-rasterization | GPU RasterizationOffloads page rendering from your CPU to your GPU, which arguably makes this a higher risk/potentially lower reward feature depending on what you do online. Graphics-heavy content is likely to see a performance boost and you can check this for yourself with the in-browser frame counter found in the developer tools: Ctrl + Shift + J > Console Drawer > 3-dot menu > Rendering > FPS meter.

Available for: Windows, Mac, Linux, Chrome OS, Android (#num-raster-threads may also be of interest)

Bonus round: Hidden T-rex dinosaur game

On the subject of hidden features, did you know that Chrome has an offline T-rex mini-game? The next time you see a connection error screen (chrome://network-error/-106), hit the spacebar or up arrow to begin a side scrolling jump game with a T-rex hurdling cacti and pterodactyls. Your progress and high score is tracked but lost when the window is closed or refreshed.

5 days, 5 killer tech tips is a TechSpot monthly feature

On the third week of every month, we'll publish 5 killer tech tips, one for each day of the week for a given app, service, or platform.

This week we are covering great tips and tricks for the Google Chrome browser.

• Day 1: Customizing Chrome's New Tab page
• Day 2: 5 Great Chrome Extensions You Should Install + Using Chrome Remote Desktop
• Day 3: Five Experimental Chrome Settings Worth Enabling
• Day 4: Chrome Tab Management Tips and Extensions
• Day 5: How to Run Android Apps in Google Chrome